Oil & Gas

By Anthony Isibor

THE stakeholders in the Nigerian gas sector have expressed worry that the new administration in the country may affect the implementation of the ongoing Decade of Gas Plan.

They have therefore called on the incoming administration not to scuttle country’s efforts at achieving a secured gas future by not jettisoning the Decade of Gas plan.

Speaking on the theme “Ensuring the Realization of Nigeria’s Decade of Gas”, a segment dedicated to the Nigeria Gas Association at the ongoing Nigeria International Energy Summit on Wednesday in Abuja stated that the decade of gas plan is the best and most comprehensive Private-Public framework that can ever be reached.

Philip Mshelbila, Managing Director, Nigeria LNG Ltd.,who spoke passionately on the efforts that have been put in on achieving a secured energy future with gas as Africa and Nigeria’s choice of transitioning energy, said that this decade of gas was crucial because of the limited window of opportunities for the group.

“The first promoters, who lunched the plan are on their way out, so we will have a new administration, but we cannot afford a disruption in the plan.

“The biggest challenge that we have today is to ensure that this plan remains on track, and is implemented as planned.

“We do have our own plans, and we can catch up with the countries that are doing tremendous and amazing things.

“If we do not act now, we will end up having to take very different actions which would put us in a catch up position and we will no longer have the control of our destiny, but would have to rely on others to ensure that we are able to achieve some degree of energy security to ensure that we can address the energy poverty that we face, and to enable us to take up the third challenge of the energy transition.

“We have the opportunity to take control of our destiny, this decade of gas plan is probably the most comprehensive plan that we have put together till date.

“The reason is because to put together this plan, we have gone back in time and have looked at other plans developed in the past and we have taken the valuables from those plans and looked at today’s realities, which include the energy transition and put together a plan that we believe is indeed the single most comprehensive plan.

“We realize that if we don’t act now, the social acceptability of what we have traditionally done is waning, funding for the types of activities for what we have done is disappearing.

“We must also address the social pressure. What was a decade of gas, has become maybe seven and half years. And on top of that, we have a change in administration,’’ he said.

He noted that although the nation’s decade of gas plan is ambitious, it can be done because it is focused on four pillars and looked at the demand trend.

“Where is the demand today, where will it be going tomorrow and where will it be in 2030; where will it be by 2050.

“It has looked at the supply side and in looking at the supply side, not just arm waving of the reserves, but actually gone to the level of identifying the 10 key projects that will ensure that we achieve our objectives within the decade. So it is down to specifics.

It also identified what infrastructure is needed to connect the demand and supply. Some of which are already in play.

“We have an idea of the cost and there is an understanding that government needs to lead, there is a recognition that government cannot fund everything itself either. And so, within the plan is that government will put down an initial 1-2 billion dollars every year, on top of which it can attract counterpart funding from the private sector.

“The whole funding aspect of it is also understood.

“Fourthly, it also looked at the connections; very essential. We looked at pricing, how do we go from where we are today to a cost effective pricing, all the way to a market driven pricing system within the period of time.

“We have worked out a schedule that looked at actions that need to be taken in the first 6 months, first 12 months, first 24 months and subsequently.

“It is a very detailed schedule with milestones and so on,” he added.

According to him, there is a governance that has been put in place that has the ministry of state for petroleum leading. It has sponsors that cut across the industry including the regulators and all those who need to be at the table.

“I believe that we are spending today to deliberate on the decade of gas because it is important that as key stakeholders, we understand, and we also support it and that we are not going back to days where every 10 years, we are either doing gas master plan or this other plan.

“We have it, and my appeal to those who have the ears of the next coming administration is when they come up and settle down quickly, let us simply pick this up and run with it.

“This is probably the best example of public private partnership that we have in this country and this is how we can secure the future economy of Nigeria,” he said.

In his remarks, Simbi Kasie Wabote, Executive Secretary, Nigeria Content Development Monitoring Board, NCDMB, called on all relevant stakeholders not to lose focus in the implementation of the decade of gas plan.

He urged all the stakeholder, federal, state, local governments, government agencies, government bodies, institutions and individuals to play their roles and do their beat to ensure that success is achieved.

According to him, the journey towards achieving the decade of gas is a marathon and not a sprint and that it is possible that the incoming government may give the programme a new name. 

“It must not lose focus on the importance of gas to our energy needs and economic development.

Speaking on Building Local Content and Capacity for the realization of the Nigeria decade of gas, Wabote said that so much had been done in promoting local content and noted that the problem is not the availability of gas reserves in the country, but how to make it available to the people.

KN

Tags: Anthony Isibor Decade of Gas Plan Nigeria Gas Association Nigeria International Energy Summit Philip Mshelbila Simbi Kasie Wabote